Beagle v. Amazon.com Inc

Opinion

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3 4 5 6 7 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON 8 AT SEATTLE

9 10 MEREDITH BEAGLE, et al., CASE NO. C24-0316JLR 11 Plaintiffs, ORDER v. 12 AMAZON.COM, INC. et al., 13 Defendants. 14

15 Before the court is Plaintiffs Meredith Beagle, Jordan Guerrero, and Sofauna 16 Johnson’s (collectively, “Plaintiffs”) “ex parte motion to correct not[ing] date on ex parte 17 motion for expedited discovery.” (Mot. (Dkt. # 47).) Plaintiffs ask the court to re-note 18 their motion to expedite discovery as a same-day motion under this District’s local rules. 19 (Mot. at 1; see also Disc. Mot. (Dkt. # 45)); see Local Rules W.D. Wash. LCR 7(d)(1) 20 (providing that ex parte motions shall be noted as same-day motions). The court 21 DENIES Plaintiffs’ motion. 22 // 1 First, filing an ex parte motion for expedited discovery was not appropriate. “Ex 2 parte applications are a form of emergency relief that will only be granted upon an

3 adequate showing of good cause or irreparable injury to the party seeking relief.” Greer 4 v. County of San Diego, No. 19-cv-378-JO-DEB, 2022 WL 104724, at *1 (S.D. Cal. Jan. 5 11, 2022) (quoting Langer v. McHale, No. 13cv2721-CAB-NLS, 2014 WL 4922351, at 6 *2 (S.D. Cal. Aug. 20, 2014)). Plaintiffs do not explain why they believe ex parte relief 7 is warranted in this case, in which Defendants Amazon.com Inc. and Amazon.com 8 Services LLC (together, “Amazon”) have already appeared. (See generally Mot.; Mot.

9 for Exp. Disc.) Plaintiffs argue that Amazon “routinely files Ex Parte Motions for 10 Expedited Discovery” (Mot. at 1), but those cases involved early discovery for the 11 limited purpose of identifying defendants on whom process could not otherwise be 12 served, see generally Amazon.com, Inc. v. Weiyuan, No. C23-0931RSM, 2024 WL 13 992609 (W.D. Wash. Feb. 22, 2024); Amazon.com, Inc. v. Phmn9y3v, No.

14 C22-0840MJP, 2023 WL 1869291 (W.D. Wash. Jan. 11, 2023). Here, Amazon has 15 already appeared, and it must be afforded an opportunity to respond to Plaintiffs’ motion 16 for expedited discovery. 17 Second, Plaintiffs improperly noted their motion for expedited discovery. 18 Plaintiffs noted their motion as a 14-day motion, but 14-day motions encompass only

19 “[m]otions for relief from a deadline[] and motions for protective order.” Local Rules 20 W.D. Wash. LCR 7(d)(2). Because a motion for expedited discovery is not “specifically 21 listed in LCR 7(d)(1), 7(d)(2), and 7(d)(4),” Plaintiffs’ motion should be “noted for 22 consideration no earlier than 21 days from the date of filing.” Id. LCR 7(d)(3). 1 For the foregoing reasons, the court DENIES Plaintiffs’ motion to correct a noting 2 date (Dkt. # 47), DIRECTS the Clerk to re-note Planitiffs’ motion for expedited

3 discovery (Dkt. # 45) for consideration on September 27, 2024, and DIRECTS Plaintiffs’ 4 counsel to review this District’s Local Civil Rules, available at 5 https://www.wawd.uscourts.gov/local-rules-and-orders. 6 Dated this 10th day of September, 2024. A 7 JAMES L. ROBART 8 United States District Judge 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

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